Krispy Kreme

The Issaquah Krispy Kreme store is Washington state's first, and so far only, KK store in the Northwest. When it opened in the fall of 2001, it seemed like everyone had to visit all at the same time. We went the Friday morning after Thanksgiving, and there were still lots of cars there

We're standing in front of a Home Depot store; the KK store is in the middle of the frame. A Starbucks Coffee is out of the frame on the right. Almost all of the cars in the picture are headed for KK. There were two State Troopers (I believe) assigned to queueing the cars. The five lanes merge into one, loops behind the store on the right before arriving at the Drive Through window, which is on the near right end of the store. As we walked toward the end of the "people" line, I asked the driver of the car at the window how long they'd been waiting: 45 minutes. When all the lanes are filled with cars, the wait is over four hours.

We decided to walk through, and waited in line less than thirty minutes. The line continued out the far door, then back outside the windows to the right. Periodically, a KK employee with a big platter full of warm doughnuts would walk down the line with free samples. I'm sure the common thought after eating it was, "Gee, I was gonna get two or three. I think I'll get a dozen!"

Curt, with Bonnie's brother Rick. We'd already decided to get two dozen—twelve raised, and twelve assorted. Doughnuts are 65 cents apiece, and $5.59 a dozen. The hats were free

From a previous trip to the KK in the Excalibur in Las Vegas, the next two shots show parts of the cooking machine. Here, they're making raised, hole-less doughnuts that will later be filled with lemon or custard cream. The white blobs near the HOT sign are being cooked. They pass through a device that flips them over for the other half of their trip through the hot oil

Bonnie looks on "reflectively" as she watches in anticipation as the doughnuts go under the glazing "waterfall". The conveyor continues around toward the store's sales counter, where workers pluck hot doughnuts to serve to waiting patrons. See the white lines around the middle of the doughnuts? A result of floating in the oil, they're the less-cooked area of the doughnut

Back home, and there's only one left

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